Leading members of the cast of BBC's War & Peace admit to never having read
the book before they started work on the current production

It is without question one of the greatest books in world literature: loved, admired, sold in every language, imitated and even parodied.

But there is one nagging question which remains about Leo Tolstoy’s epic novel, War & Peace. Has anyone ever actually read it?

Lily James as Natasha Rostov in War & Peace Photo: Mitch Jenkins

Certainly not the cast of the BBC’s latest blockbuster costume drama, which starts tonight.

The corporation’s production of War & Peace, which took more than two years to make and included filming in three countries, brings together a crop of the finest young acting talent to play characters whose lives are turned upside down by the impact of Napoleonic expansionism on Tsarist Russia.

But in what some might regard as a sad reflection of the narrow cultural background of today's young actors, the leading members of the cast have admitted to never having read the original book before they started work on the current production.

Paul Dano, the American actor who plays the idealistic but hot-headed young Pierre Bezukhov, admits: “I’d always meant to get round to reading War & Peace. I was always very excited to read it when I got the job. I wasn’t disappointed – it’s a wonderful novel. A few parts are hard, but the trick is that you have to just keep reading.”

Dano, 31, previously seen in 12 Years A Slave and There Will Be Blood, can be forgiven, since he had at least previously read Tolstoy’s Anna Karenina and its story of the eponymous tragic heroine set against the backdrop of Russian stifling feudal system.

Similarly Lily James, the Downton Abbey star who plays Natasha Rostova, whose charm and kind-hearted nature captivates both Dano and his best friend Andrei Bolkonsky, only started reading War & Peace once she was given the part.

But once she started she could not stop.

“It’s so addictive,” said James, 26. “I was reading it while we were filming Downton Abbey. I’d be reading between takes at the dining table. The director would call ‘Action!’ and – bang! – the book would be back under the table.”

War & Peace is admittedly a demanding read, not only for its length – at over 1,200 pages - but also for its heady mixture of historical narrative drama, romantic fiction and philosophical discourse, as well as its cast of almost 600 characters and bewildering shifts in setting.

It obviously pays to persevere with it however. Nelson Mandela read during his long incarceration and declared it his favourite novel, while Soviet soldiers were given sections from the book to inspire them in their fight against the Nazis.​

James Norton, who plays Bolkonsky, the cynical prince sick of a stifling marriage who longs for glory on the battlefield, did at least carry a copy of Tolstoy’s novel around with while on the set of the TV crime drama Happy Valley.

The cast of BBC drama 'War & Peace' Photo: BBC

But thought he started reading it while filming he never got beyond the first ten pages.

“When I did Happy Valley I did carry War & Peace at one point, even though I hadn’t got this job,” he said. My character went into a charity shop to disguise himself and picked up this red book, and it’s War & Peace.

“So the only bit I’d read before was when I was sitting at that bus stop, waiting for the cameras to turn around. I got through around ten pages.”

Some of the production’s older actors, such as Greta Scacchi, who plays Countess Rostova, also admit to being daunted by the thought of reading Tolstoy’s masterpiece.

“I’d never had the courage to read it before, but being in it now has bene an incentive,” she said. “It’s great being an actor – you get a literature degree forced upon you by all the books you have to study as part of your profession.

From left: Catiche played by Fenella Woolgar, Anna Mikhailovna played by Rebecca Front, Prince Vassily Kuragin played by Stephen Rea and Pierre Bezukhov played by Paul Dano Photo: BBC

Even the production’s acclaimed screenwriter, Andrew Davies, admitted – rather shamefacedly - that he had not read the book until he started work on his TV adaptation.

“I’d been saving it up,” said, who admits to having ‘sexed-up’ certain sections of the book

Of course, once they started reading War & Peace, all three were hooked by its majestic sweep across eight years of Russian history and its detailed evocation of the lives of its protagonists, from peasants to soldiers, princes and society hostesses and the marriages, affairs, births, deaths and bloody battles they and their country endure.

A scene taken from the BBC drama, War & Peace Photo: BBC

Or as Woody Allan, who parodied the story in his film Love and Death, put it: “I took a speed reading course where you run your finger down the middle of the page and was able to read 'War and Peace' in twenty minutes. It's about Russia."

“It’s brilliant – I love it,” he said. “The job has actually been a great reason to read it and now I’m one of those smug people who can say they’ve read it.”

James, who also starred in last year’s Disney version of Cinderella, said: “He always finds the core of a character. He hones in on what’s important and universal, which is why War & Peace is such a classic.”

Perhaps the performances of these new Tolstoy fans will encourage another generation to pick up and actually read his greatest work.

And they should not let its length put them off. “It’s a total page turner,” says Scacchi.